Auf dem Wasser zu singen

Auf dem Wasser zu singen: Yet Another Interviewwith Anton Long

The following is taken from interview conducted by F.D. on a Summer night 114yf/2003eh.
Do you believe the future of the Order to now be in America? If so, would it be right to assume that this would imply the necessity for creating a semi-public presence agitating for disruption and change? Or does the Order remain and grow as it now is, hidden but working away within England – and indeed Ireland?
A: The answer to the first part is yes, and no. Yes, insofar as America should give rise to the first practical, sinister, manifestation of the next stage – a new society, based upon the Law of the New Aeon, and the emergence of Vindex – and will thus become the centre of that practical manifestation; and no, insofar as the esoteric essence, manifest in one way in a physical nexion and in another in a small esoteric teaching community, will remain in Europe. Expressed simply, America will be the home of the outer aspect of the Order, with all that involves, while the inner aspect remains where it is and has been for a long time. However, there will come a time when the inner aspect will need, due to practical circumstances, to be duplicated elsewhere – but even this will not be in America.

A semi-public presence would be one of the manifestations of the outer Order, in America.

In the MS Words of Vermiel there is mention of interacting with a Star-Gate; are there plans – aside from the Star Game – to extend the ONA’s symbolic language into a cosmic one, creating symbols and magickal techniques which are not Earth based?
A: Yes. But this requires advanced mastery of our Way, and only a few individuals, at present, are capable of the thinking which is required to even begin this.

What is required is a new way of thinking, and a new way of being – a move toward the acausal, by the individual. Conventional magick operates in the causal, using acausal energy. Internal Magick is a move toward the acausal by the individual, and this is the beginning of the being, the thinking, which is required.

In time – of many, many decades – a few more will advance, and learn, and master this new way of being. But this requires many practical changes, in people, in society – it requires the new society of the New Aeon, which in itself means the destruction of the old order and the mental tyranny of the present, not to mention the physical tyranny which the New World Order is creating.

We can now step over the threshold into a new way of being – and so begin the next stage of our evolution. Opening pathways to the acausal continuum itself. Conventional (external) magick, and even internal and Aeonic magick, are but beginnings – there is so much more, which will take us toward immortality, and enable us, by the very nature of the acausal continuum, to travel the Cosmos without the need of physical machines. But it must be understood that last the stage of the Seven-Fold Way is only the beginning of this, and to achieve that Grade takes one individual many, many decades. So far, this century, only one person has achieved it. We have the potential to achieve that Grade – to evolve past even that – but have wasted and are wasting this potential.

Some symbols – or the prototype language, if you prefer – and some techniques, already exist, but to use them, to understand them, requires that apprenticeship which is the Seven-Fold Way up to the stage of Master/ Lady Master. Two individuals, in the old country – one male, one female – are heading toward this stage, but as yet no one in America is near this stage, so there is a long way to go.

Given the proved Astronomical significance of the various stone circles and alignments, is there any received information within the Order regarding the human species originating from somewhere other than Earth? Do you believe the alignments represent a knowledge which is now lost concerning our relation to the stars – or do we, according to the principles of evolution, now know more than we have ever known?
A: There is no received information about our origins. There is no “lost knowledge” is that sense – although we have lost a great deal through the modern way of living. One thing we have lost is the sense, the intuition (and that is what it was) of our belonging: to Nature, to Earth, to the Cosmos. But we have also acquired many things – one of which is a rational understanding of ourselves; another is a knowledge of how to consciously change ourselves; and another is our ability of empathy, of true magick. Real magick is an empathy – a knowing, a sense-ing, of the matrix of acausality which binds all living things together.

We – or rather, esoteric Initiates – do indeed know more, or can learn more, than we have ever known or learnt.
Is Satan, for the Order, a supra-personal being with which we can communicate, or an archetype residing in our psyche drawn out into our being via invokation – or both?

A: To fully answer the question one has to understand the true nature of such things as causal, acausal, being, presencing, sinister, archetype, not to mention the nature of an individual and what is “communication”.

An archetype is a particular manifestation of acausal energy in the causal – a living being, but a being with an acausal “nature” (or more correctly a partly acausal and partly causal nature). This being is born (or can be created), lives, declines, and then ceases to exist on the level of existence where it was manifest (our psyche). But there are beings beyond these archetypes – beings which are more acausal, and beings which are purely acausal. That is, which have more acausal energy than archetypes.

What is named as “Satan” is beyond an archetype, just as the “Dark Gods” are.

In the simplistic sense, archetypes are related to the stages up to Adept; the next type of acausal beings we can perceive – or more correctly, which can be accessed in some way, or presenced in the causal – relate to the Abyss and beyond. That is, archetypes cease to have any effect, on an individual who is beyond a certain stage of our Way, and this is one meaning of being an Adept.

There is no communication, but rather an apprehension. This apprehension, for archetypes, is fairly simple. Beyond archetypes, it is much more complex and does not rely on our conventional senses and the way of causal apprehension: which is via sounds, colours, “words”, images, and collocations of these (such as a static Tarot image, such an image used in as magickal way, or a magickal rite), synchronistic or otherwise.

A magickal apprehension is a participation – an expansion of one’s own being, and thus an evolution. Hence, “Satan” is one means of evolution, magickal and otherwise.

Is there still a purpose to the traditional Satanic ceremonies – particularly the Black Mass – or are they now outmoded?
A: Yes. A beginning. A learning. A liberation. A moving toward that apprehension wherein is knowledge of causal and acausal, sinister and non-sinister, and what is beyond.

But there will come a time when this beginning, and learning, is not needed any more. This will be after the New Aeon has been manifest for some time, and moved individuals towards the next stage of our evolution.

There will then be the apprehension mentioned earlier – the new language (beyond symbolism) and the new magickal methods, which relate to the Cosmos and not this Earth. But first, we must liberate this world from the tyranny it now endures. First, we need many individuals living according to the Law of the New Aeon, and many individuals becoming Adepts of our Way.
Esoteric chant is, for me, one of the most powerful and original of the ONA’s teachings. Just how important is it for Initiates to master this technique – for their own development, and also in terms of the effects such a technique has in the wider world (and beyond)? Are all the chants now written down, or are there some which have to be taught on a teacher/pupil basis?
A: It is very important, because it is one means of magickal apprehension – a powerful magickal techniques which can open, and create, certain nexions, nexions which are Aeonically necessary. In one sense, it is one step toward one of the new non-Earth based, Cosmic, magickal techniques of the future.

Most of the chants have now been written down.
Is Hangter’s Gate a re-telling of a real event, and if so, were the details of this event originally communicated orally by Master/Mistress to pupil, and will there be more such Traditional Folk tales to relate?

A: Yes, yes and yes.
Is the Order near to realising some of its long term goals – i.e. the founding of some type of rural community/presence?
A: To achieve this goal takes three things – the right individuals at the right level of understanding; the right external circumstances (the condition of our societies – how close the New Aeon is); and the opening of a certain nexion in the area where this physical nexion must be.

It will arise when the time for its arrival has come; and this time is near. For two of the conditions are already fulfilled.

I once read in an Order MSS a reference to ‘alchemical seasons’. What does this mean in terms of Nature, and can these seasons by experienced and lived within, in the same manner as the four seasons?

A: An alchemical season is a natural process which occurs in Nature, and also in we ourselves, who are beings of Nature. They are Change; a natural dialectic; and span several, or many, of the “Four seasons”.

In one sense, the Internal Adept rite is a very simple “alchemical season” in relation to an individual. In relation to Nature, an alchemical season is either a natural, or a magickally-induced, change or evolution. The creation of a physical nexion is one type of created, induced, evolution, and this creation occurs over an alchemical season.

There are also, of course, Cosmic alchemical seasons, some of which we know – in terms of their beginnings and their ending – by various observed astronomical events, often relating to star or planetary alignments, which alignments also, sometimes, signify the length of a alchemical season in relation to Nature.

Some might argue that – esoterically/magickally – the practice of human sacrifice is a little archaic. Why is such an act still regarded as important – what does it create in magickal terms, and why?

A: It is important on several levels. As a necessary means of Initiate learning; as a necessary magickal act – a presencing of the dark: a drawing down of acausal energy, if you prefer. As a means of aiding the Sinister Dialectic; and as a means of removing the worthless, dishonourable dross so manifest in the societies of our time.

Magickally, it aids internal magick (the evolution of the individual); aids Aeonic magick; and opens nexions. It ensures the Order stays esoteric and that its Adepts are genuine Adepts of the Sinister Tradition. And of course it also adds to the aura of the Order itself, and weeds out the dross.